Facebook is an immensely popular social networking site that works within the existing social networks that thrive in places where young people are forced to congregate: high schools and colleges.
Tapping into this existing network (and offering a simpler, cleaner interface than MySpace), Facebook has grown to something like 9 million users. It's the second-meanest kid on the social net block, and I've been part of some spirited MySpace vs. Facebook discussions, which are really weird and a bit sectarian.
Facebook is essentially a really slick front end for a powerful database, allowing non-tech-savvy users to create profile pages and linked relationships with other people in the database. The interesting thing about Facebook is that it will tell you when your friends update their profiles. Up until this week, you had to click on someone's profile and examine it to see where the change was made. Sometimes it was almost impossible to tell, which was annoying.
On September 5, Facebook changed its layout. Well, not even just the layout...they radically renovated the functionality of their site. Since Facebook uses a database (just like these blog apps) to manage content (as opposed to static HTML), they took the logical "next step" in the evolution of their program: serving all the updated information (profiles, etc.) to users via feeds.
Now, when you log in, you get an enormous list of everything your friends have been up to. No need to scour a profile to see what's changed. It's right there for your instantaneous consumption. Facebook stalking just became really easy.
Lots (LOTS, seriously, a shitload) of people are really pissed about this. The general consensus is that it's an invasion of privacy.
I don't think it's that. It's a much better delivery of information that was already being kept in a database. As such, the invasion of privacy isn't being perpetrated by Facebook. It's the users who are at fault. They invaded their own privacy (can you do that? Is that like a mobius strip or something?) by putting huge amounts of detailed information on the Facebook site.
But maybe it's not our fault, exactly. Because as a whole, this generation (of which I am part) couldn't care less about our privacy online. We aren't worried like our parents were about divulging transactional credit-card information online, nor are we worried that Google (and others) have possession of all our emails and search records.
It may be that we don't care, but I reckon (based on the reaction to the Facebook Feed shift) that we just didn't know. We had no idea that there were massive servers holding iterative versions of our profiles, pictures, messages and comments. So maybe this will be a revolution for young people. Maybe we'll see that this is just an example of a larger problem with privacy. Maybe, if Facebook decides to change back as a result of the public outcry, we'll even vote. Doubtful.
I'm not being quite as eloquent as I was earlier in the day. Go check out David's reportage on the topic. I discussed these issues in the comments with David and Ann Handley. It was fun, and I think it is good reading. Why is it that some of your best thinking happens in a comment box?